More benign than Condi, more popular than Christie

Your friend & mine Jack McCullough has previously warned you of the pending arrival of Condoleezza Rice. The very next day, our fair land will welcome a much more constructive political figure, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. She’s the featured speaker at the VDP’s annual David W. Curtis Awards dinner on Friday evening.

And hey, you remember the VTGOP’s endless crowing over the success of its Chris Christie fundraiser in December? Well, the Warren event is going to easily surpass it in attendance, and most likely in fundraising as well. Late last week, the VDP had to put a lid on ticket sales because they’d already sold more than 900 — nearing capacity at the Champlain Valley Expo. The party has already taken in more than $125,000, plus whatever additional funds they wangle out of attendees on Friday night. (There is still room for a few more folks, but VDP is asking anyone interested to call them for information at 802-229-1783.)

By comparison, the Republicans were practically orgasmic over a turnout of 650 for Christie. And remember, this was pre-Bridgegate, when Christie was widely considered the front-runner for the 2016 Presidential nomination.

Of course, a lot of folks would like to see Warren as the Democratic nominee… or, an intriguing prospect I heard recently, a Clinton/Warren ticket. Sounds good to me.

Clearly, the Democrats’ ceiling for enthusiasm and fundraising is far higher than the Republicans’. And clearly, there’s a whole lot of interest in a politician with a clear and positive liberal message. I look forward to finding out just how successful Friday night will be.

Related

Post navigation

4 thoughts on “More benign than Condi, more popular than Christie”

As I understand it both from advertising and posters on the bookshop door, the event is at the Unitarian Universalist Church at the top of Church St. (more capacity). The event is being sponsored by Phoenix Books (one of my favorite independent bookstores), and tickets are required, available at the bookstore.

So if you didn’t get tix to the Curtis Award dinner, you might still have a chance to see and hear Elizabeth Warren Friday afternoon (doors open at 2:30; Warren scheduled for 3:30.

NanuqFC

In the last analysis, politics is not predictions and politics is not observations. Politics is what we do. Politics is what we do, politics is what we create, by what we work for, by what we hope for and what we dare to imagine. ~ Senator Paul Wellstone

There is an evil which ought to be guarded against in the indefinite accumulation of property from the capacity of holding it in perpetuity by … corporations. The power of all corporations ought to be limited in this respect. The growing wealth acquired by them never fails to be a source of abuses. ~ James Madison

First, how will WGOP spin this? They’ll have to cover it, of course, but they will have to downplay it so that Christie’s barely 650 will sound much better to their viewers that Warren’s sold-out crowd of 900.

More importantly, it is too bad Vermont’s Democratic Party are moderate Republicans and not Democrats. Instead of having their fundraising event at the virulently anti-union Expo site, the Democratic Party could have had half-again-as-many people AND supported Labor too, by holding it at the Union-staffed Flynn Theater.

The Professional Firefighters intentionally moved their concerts from the Expo to the Flynn several years ago specifically because the Expo adamantly refused to hire a union stage crew (at the request of the Firefighters)! Obviously the Democratic Party of Vermont doesn’t support Labor Unions either, otherwise they would never have had their event at the Expo.